The present invention relates to a vehicular electrical equipment unit heating and cooling system for heating or cooling an electrical equipment unit on an electric vehicle which runs only by the driving force of a motor or a so-called hybrid vehicle which runs by driving forces of an engine and a motor.
In the electric vehicle or hybrid vehicle, when electricity is supplied from the battery which is a direct current power supply to the motor, a direct current is converted into an alternating one by the inverter, and furthermore, in the hybrid vehicle, when part of the output of the engine or the kinetic energy of the vehicle is stored in the battery via the motor, an alternating current is converted into a direct one by the inverter.
Incidentally, while the battery and the inverter entrains heat when they are in operation, in the event that the temperature of the battery increases too high, the charging and discharging performance of the battery is decreased, and the life of the battery is made shorter, and in the event that a certain heat-resistant temperature is exceeded, there is caused a risk that the inverter is damaged. Consequently, a cooling apparatus for cooling the battery or the inverter is required, and there occurs a case where air inside the passenger compartment is used as a cooling medium for the cooling apparatus (for example, refer to a patent literature No. 1).
In addition, since the charging and discharging performance of the battery is also decreased when the temperature thereof becomes too low, a heating apparatus is required. Then, it is considered to use air in the passenger compartment as a heating medium for heating the battery.
When the air in the passenger compartment is used as the cooling medium or heating medium as is described above, an air passageway for passing air therethrough is required. For example, in a cooling apparatus disclosed in a patent literature No. 2, a space defined by a deck side, a rim and a body outer is used as a duct (an air passageway).
[Patent Literature No. 1]
JP-A-2003-79003
[Patent Literature No. 2]
JP-A-2002-231321
Here, as to the heating of the battery, it is desired that the heating performance is improved and that the effect on the control of passenger compartment temperature is reduced.
In addition, in vehicles where space is limited, the volume of the air flow path is required to be decreased. In addition, there is a big demand to decrease the costs.
Then, an object of the invention is to provide a vehicular electrical equipment unit heating and cooling system which can attempt to make the system compact in size, reduce the costs and improve the heating performance and a hybrid vehicle in which the vehicular electrical equipment unit heating and cooling system is installed.